I might have to try a Marathon Huge Highlands with Raging Barbs.
I know from Epic experienec that it's utterly impossible to use "sentinels" in the early game, there's simply no chance in hell of an exposed unit surviving. Only units stacked 3 deep in cities on hills can stay alive. Eventually the heavy attacks subside and you can then push back the fog, using axemen or horse archers to kill the barbs that come in anyway. Also depending on the peak/lake layout it's sometimes possible to completely seal off entire fronts with a string of fortified units, barbs will tend to path around such blockades rather than trying to bash through them, even if the defenses are rather thin. This does result in a funneling effect though that results in massive attacks on the gaps - over a dozen barbs at once I've seen. But I had longbows by then, and guerilla longbows rip barbs a new one.
Hmmm raging barbs on Marathon Highlands are even worse than I expected. Got wiped out in 2240 by barb Archers, I research Animal Husbandary then immediately to Archery, and still didn't have an archer out.
My primary mistake was in training a worker (period), it had barely finished an improvement when the barbs came in and pillaged it. So for Marathon Raging, no workers, just expansion by building cities on plains hills and resources. Rivers are obviously going to be a godsend.
ROFL now this is quite a few barbs. Especially consdering that I my position is very strong. I had the incredible luck of the hill I happened to found on contain Copper.
This game I'd beelined STRAIGHT to Archery (but china doesn't start with hunting), I'd trained my 2nd Archer when 2 barb archers arrived and simultaneously attacked, a 2xArcher attack will easily destroy any player relying on a single warrior, and may wipe out 2 warriors.
This game is in the bag, but it's going to be entertaining. I have 2 axemen and I have to micro them to protect both the city and the woodchoppers. There's no way I'll be making any improvement so workers are strictly woodchoppers.
At least you know the AI is suffering the same.
One thing for sure, barb spawn rate is INDEPENDENT of game speed. If barbs spawned at a rate proportional to that which civs build units, then on Quick there would be streams of stacks of 6 barbs, like take the above screenshot and multiply every barb by 6, that's how many quick would have if the spawn rate was proportional.
As it is on Marathon the barb problems are MUCH greater than on faster speeds, as in you have to deal with twice as many barbs, or deal with the same number of barbs but with half the defensive units, whichever way you please to look at it.
Hopefully if Firaxis does "fix" this, they'll add triple-raging barbs for people like me.
I have yet to try marathon speed, but I'm curious: Do you end up with much more heavily promoted troops as a consequence? I would expect so with all the extra fighting.
I love promotions - it allows more tactical decisions-making, especially since the other tactical possibilities of the combat system are, shall we say, a bit on the simplistic side.
Another thought...maybe the limit on experience you can receive from barbs should be raised, so you don't end up fighting the raging hordes for "nothing"?
"When I get a little money I buy books; and if any is left I buy food and clothes." -Desiderius Erasmus
Yes, you get higher promotions.
Another simply huge effect is that units heal a lot "faster" on Marathon, in a given era a unit can reheal and fight many, many more times. For this reason it pays more to take care of your units.
Something about fighting the raging hordes: Each combat is very, very skewed in the players favor. My combats are often 99%+, as such each battle usually only gives 1exp. Even with huge swarms of barbs they still give meaningful exp, it's just a matter of giving the 10exp units some R&R time, you obviously need all your units in the city when the big waves hit, but the trickles are great for promoting up the green units. Something else is the sheer number of units you need, each city needs a minimum of 3 units (the Garrison). Each woodchopping pack needs 2 guardians, each improvement worked needs a unit or two fortified on top. 6 units per city is almost a bare minimum. By the time I have 3 cities I'll have 20 units, it takes hundreds of babs to promote them all to 10exp.
If anything, barracks aren't that needed... just kill 4 warriors, there are plenty of them after all.
This is to be expected once you get the ball rolling, because units are only twice instead of three times as expensive to build you can expand and improve your territory relatively faster, leading to quicker economic growth.Originally posted by devincutler
It seems like the ideal setting for hardcore SP civers. I do agree that it seems that techs are happening a bit faster timeline-wise.
I'm still not sure what the reasons are for the increased barb activity, I think it's a combination of the huge map size, highlands topology, marathon speed, number of civs. I played a game on emperor level and epic speed as Ghengis Khan up until about 1600AD at which point I was number 8 out of 14 in a 15 civ game, Washington was eliminated. Hatshepsut and Saladin were leading. I quit when Julius Caesar and Peter the Great decided to attack, and I figured it probably wasn't going to be a win. With all the barb fighting in the beginning, development was slowed down, so no early conquest was possible.Originally posted by Blake
One thing for sure, barb spawn rate is INDEPENDENT of game speed. If barbs spawned at a rate proportional to that which civs build units, then on Quick there would be streams of stacks of 6 barbs, like take the above screenshot and multiply every barb by 6, that's how many quick would have if the spawn rate was proportional.
As it is on Marathon the barb problems are MUCH greater than on faster speeds, as in you have to deal with twice as many barbs, or deal with the same number of barbs but with half the defensive units, whichever way you please to look at it.
Hopefully if Firaxis does "fix" this, they'll add triple-raging barbs for people like me.
Afterwards, I started a game huge/highlands/marathon/Capac/emperor/15 civs and it was amazing. While I had two cities, and trying to establish the third over copper, the axemen came. You have to get axemen before they do to make it. Up until then it was great, my Quechuas had killed about 30 archers and 20 warriors and were well promoted. My mistake was not having enough archers (too many Quechuas), so when the axemen came, it was game over.
My present game is a standard size/highlands/marathon/Elizabeth/emperor/11 civs and barb activity is much less, only about twice normal. Cultural borders have closed in fast, though I suspect with the default 7 civs, there would have been more intense barb activity.
So, how does barb activity change as a function of highlands map type, map size, game speed, and number of civs? I ordered 2GB more for my PC to handle huge/highlands better (the 1.5G was maxing out), though I suspect that large is the biggest that I'll play for now, partly for lag and game time reasons. Not sure what the lag would be like in the modern era, but it was just tolerable when I ended with cavalry/scientific method.
Also, I was playing normal barbarian, not raging.
Edit:
I wrote a long post about the Dark Ages, only to find that the page numbers are on the left hand side and the post I was responding to was fairly old. I'm new here. Give me a break.
I tried marathon, and so far I love it. It is now 160 AD My Roman Legions are one of the top units on the continent. Christianity (Theology) was just invented, so this shows a somewhat historical sync with the real world. Its just one game so far, things might be different with other games, but I am loving it so far.
About Barbarians. This game I didn't have much of a prob with the barbs. I don't know if this is due to my strategy or what. As far as I can tell, Barbs spawn in the dark lands out of your line of site. One of the things I do is place warriors on hills as watchers. They keep the areas lit up, so no barbs spawn. When I encounter a barb city, I place an archer or other unit in the trees and preferably on a hill right outside the city. The barbs can't resist attacking the archers and they usually die. That's one less barb to invade my homeland and the unit gets some good experience to boot.
I am not a great strategist. I lose most of my games LOL, but this simple strategy seems sto work well.
The Rook
Heres some pics of my marathon OCC test.... marathon speed emporer difficulty large map
1194 and researching infantry. Usually at 1000 - 1100 I'm trying to circumnavigate the globe. ome how i doubt it'll be anywhere close to 2050 when the spaceship launches.
I've read, on a non-dedicated Civ-IV forum, some people commenting that playing on Marathon mode captures the feel of the old Civ titles.
Civ-IV is my first sortie into the genre, so I wouldn't know. For the Civ veterans out there, would you say that Marathon mode does indeed capture the feel of the earlier Civ titles?
Last edited by Hengist; January 10, 2006 at 05:12.
Hengist.
Hengist's MiG Alley Site
For me, it does. I have played all 4 Civs. And so far Marathon seems to have fixed the feel I had when I played other Civs. Others may disagree, but that's mine feeling.
The Rook
for me it does as well - startet with Civ-1 ... how long ago was that?
anyway - as I had already modded Civ IV pre 1.52 from 200% epos research rate to 600% I did the same with Marathon (from 300% to 600%) and this seems to be the right speed for me...
it is correct that it takes very much time in the beginning, where you might run around with just one Warrior/Scout or even keep on pressing enter if he is wounded or even killed... but on the other hand I like the long time it takes in the beginning as well...
...in previous (unmodded) games I didn't really have to think much about researching animal-husbandry or fishing since until you have a worker (or workship) free for doing the work you would have researched it anyway... now is different... If I find stone early in the game (f.e.) i tend to research straight toward Masonry so I can get it to build wonders like the standing stones (or what is the stone-circle that gives an obelisc in every city is called?) which is one of my favorits...
I tend to lack behind real world inventions... but that doesn't bother me...
...last game I played on standard continents (everything else was random) on "noble"-difficulty... I did have some trouble with a barbarian city in the beginning but forgot all about it when the spanish attacked me just after I was able to produce my first archer...
...the battle raged for a long time and I was finally able to extinguish them...
...later on I was asked to aid Julius against the indish realm and decided to send my troops south and was able to overrun their empire within the next 200 years as well (togehter with the romans)...
...as I played the english (from random) I started to attack Julius as he declared war on Montezuma just after I was able to upgrade my first units to redcoats... he did have more units than me but his best where muscetmen at that point... it was nearly too easy...
...50 years later I won domination victory...
...I think my next game will be "monarch"-level...
Most definatly closer to the feel of previose civs.
First tech in civ3 often took 32 turns. settler production 30 turns. and i often had time to defeat entire civs with a single unit (as in attacking and ending a war with knights, or imortals, not killing everything with 1 solo guy. =P) C IV just completely changed that prior to marathon. a tech every 4 turns means by the time my new musketmen reach the BORDER they need to be upgraded.
Plus with the longer speeds you are required to be ready for war before it happens. when you can crank out a unit per turn from most cities its kind of makes it ok to run a skeleton crew.
I am most definatly a fan of the marathon speed. but something is unfair with them as i can out tech and out build the AIs on an emporer one-city-challange. I got 3 of the ancient wonders all in one city (pyramids oracle and parthenon), just go ahead and try that on standard speed.
I too have noticed that AI's are less eager to build wonders in the marathon mode.Originally posted by Hauptman
I am most definatly a fan of the marathon speed. but something is unfair with them as i can out tech and out build the AIs on an emporer one-city-challange. I got 3 of the ancient wonders all in one city (pyramids oracle and parthenon), just go ahead and try that on standard speed.
I think that this is probably due to the fact that in the marathon mode, the difference in time needed to build a wonder, as opposed to a military unit is significantly increased, thus discouraging the AI's from building wonders, when they could build a moderate sized army in the same time.
I myself LOVE the marathon mode - it made a huge difference in the game. I've completed a couple of marathon games now, and my last one was the most interesting CIV4 game I've played, and what I did there could not have been done in other modes:
Due to diplomatic circumstances that arose, I ended up in active wars with nations that I didn't share borders with; there was a few world wars with Russia, Japan and France fighting more or less against the same opponents; Me (Arabia), US and India.
But my first war was against the Atzteks, who attacked me through Chinese territory (I had good relations with the chinese untill late in the game, when I HAD TO punish them for being backstabbing would-be-friends thoughout the game). I ended up Conquering the Atztek area so that I had an empire in two parts, with my original territory to the north, my new territory to the south tip of the continent, with the chinese in between. Through various complications I ended up having to conquer the French too, and their territory wasn't connected to EITHER of my two previous territories, but did have a border with the chinese again. So my empire was a sort of a Y shape upside down, with China in the nexus part that connects all the lines.
Ended up giving MAJOR help to both the US and India to help them defend against stronger enemies throughout the game, and in the end, when the Chinese canceled open borders with me disconnecting the parts of my empire, I beelined to bomber-requirement techs, built a sizeable fleet, some tanks, and... well, that was that for the Chinese.
I then built the UN, and both Washington and Gandhi voted for me for Diplo victory, which was more than enough.
But this game could only have happened in marathon mode; it was REALLY event-filled, plus I fought the sorts of long distance wars on a large map that would have ment that my units would have been obsolete much too fast in faster time settings.
How did I finance such an undertaking? I had the good fortune of founding Buddhism very early, and having it spread very widely... but still had to beeline to Communism to get state property after conquering the Atzteks, to save myself from financial troubles.
Even the finance-aspect of such a game would make it impossible in other time settings, simply because you'd have someone finish the Apollo program before you'd recovered financially from the first conquest enough to consider participating in further conflict.
That game really blew me away - marathon mode is simply awesome!
That's both good and bad. Good that we get to build more wonders, bad that we get our heads handed to us when the AI, with their bigger army, decides that it's time for us to die. That's what Peter the Great said to me.Originally posted by MightyTiny
I too have noticed that AI's are less eager to build wonders in the marathon mode.
I think that this is probably due to the fact that in the marathon mode, the difference in time needed to build a wonder, as opposed to a military unit is significantly increased, thus discouraging the AI's from building wonders, when they could build a moderate sized army in the same time.
The present marathon game on standard/highlands/emperor is going fine. To my good fortune, just as I was gearing up for war with Tokugawa, he declares war on the very turn I discover construction, so I pumped out some catapults quickly to catch up with my axemen. Several turns later, Catherine attacks Tokugawa. Our mutual military struggle has now brought the two of us closer together.
This is my first big break, though I had only half as many cities as the AI to start. Tokugawa's empire will be mine, setting me up for the mid game. As long as he's done before he gets Samurai, which should be the case. Civil Service is 10 turns out for me, and no one else has it yet, nor machinery.
Marathon is awesome. Standard highlands with 11 civs is very fun and keeps barbs to a reasonable level. I suspect 7 civs on standard highlands would yield intense barbs again. 9 civs might be an interesting compromise, depending on what you like. It's the perfect speed for getting to fight wars with a set of units of that era without them becoming obsolete by the time they get through the war.
One problem with too few civs on a large map, even 15 civs on a huge highlands map, is getting religion. Usually, I just acquire it by roads and rivers from the AI, but there is a long time of fighting off the barbs before cultural borders close in and religions spread. In this case, I find Monarchy essential for keeping my civ happy, and beeline for it after alphabet.
Also, cutting the forests on highlands map down too soon, before health sources are hooked up, can lead to stunting also. So, a balance is required. Environmentalism comes with medicine, which makes forests (and jungle) so much more important, but the early game benefits are simply too strong to ignore.
Played my first marathon last night. It still was only a 4 hour game (according to the in game clock).
It takes a while to get used to the long build times. And I circumnavigated the globe around 1000 AD. Very early. I had military tradition very early as well. I hit alpha centauri in the 1800's- my best yet. Though amazingly I didn't get the score bonus I was anticipating. I guess you take a penalty when playing marathon mode.
Although I should note I was playing on warlord difficulty. This is way too easy for me. As I had a 2000 point lead over the next competitor..
So while the years you discover stuff is unrealistic, it is a fun mode to play.
I think the score hit you take is for difficulty not speed. I suspect the advancement of tech is due to the easier difficulty level. But this will also be due to number of civs and other factors. You need to move up in difficulty.
The dark ages are called that because the christians were destroying everything non-christian. They destroyed libraries, statues, temples, anything that reminded them of the 'heathens' and 'pagans'. Technology, architecture, and literature were lost to all but the wealthy and what survived were hidden away in church vaults. hell if grave-robbing was your only means to access books you'd call it the dark ages too!
Hey guys,
really enjoyed reading this thread. Must try marathon speed soon. But won't it be really interesting if all of us played the same game and disussed in this thread or something?
It's not though, it gets big bonuses against Barbs. Every level it gets the same bonuses that the human does while playing on Settler, it never goes up.Originally posted by Enigma_Nova
At least you know the AI is suffering the same.
That might be interesting, but it's also good hear from a variety of playing conditions and maps. I wouldn't have known how much fun highlands was if I hadn't come across this thread. It's also hard to get everyone to play on the same difficulty to compare.Originally posted by tomasson_lb89
Hey guys,
really enjoyed reading this thread. Must try marathon speed soon. But won't it be really interesting if all of us played the same game and disussed in this thread or something?
From the few highlands maps I've played on marathon, I think barb bonus that the AI gets make that kind of map play considerably harder, maybe between one half and one whole a difficulty level. Also, I suspect that the great amount of forest for wood chopping affects things.Originally posted by Willem
It's not though, it gets big bonuses against Barbs. Every level it gets the same bonuses that the human does while playing on Settler, it never goes up.
I find highlands easier because of the barbs, the reason is mostly AI brain-deadedness. Like the AI seems to prefer to create 2 garrisons per city, now these are GARRISONS, they wont move out. So an AI city could have 2 archers (or even Skirmishers) inside a city, watching while a lonely barb warrior runs around ripping up every improvement in sight. They need to actually use that big barb bonus to benefit from it.Originally posted by Willem
It's not though, it gets big bonuses against Barbs. Every level it gets the same bonuses that the human does while playing on Settler, it never goes up.
The degree to which an AI prospers on highlands depends largely on whether they can quickly hook up horses, if they get chariots out then the chariots will mop up the barbs. Otherwise the barbs will rip up all their improvements and it'll be eons before the workers leave the cities again.
I find the sweet spot for AI being ruined by Barbs is Monarch, the barbs come thick and fast and the AI production bonuses aren't quite enough. At lower difficultues the barbs aren't so plentiful, at higher the AI has more significant production bonuses.
Perhaps, but Willem's point was that the AI gets the same huge barb bonus independent of level. So, in a barb heavy map, the AI may actually do better.
I can only attest to my experiences playing at emperor, but highlands seems to play as 1/2 a difficulty level harder than pangea. Yes the AI is bad at fighting, but is the bonus so large that it overcomes that?
I'm not sure about the wood chopping aspect.
Strange, my few attempts at Marathon have resulted in me falling way behind the AI civs in technology, and very early in the game. Initially I had this problem at all speeds because I hadn't figured out the value of cottages, but I'm still getting these results after fixing my strategy. Not sure what I'm doing wrong there - has anybody else noticed this?
Not only do you have to put the cottages down, you also have to make the city work them so that they grow and become useful, which likely as not means a corresponding decrease in food and/or hammer production.
If on the other hand a city has a large income from working certain tiles (some luxury resources, for example) then it may not be necessary to put many cottages nearby.
O'Neill: I'm telling you Teal'c, if we don't find a way out of this soon, I'm gonna lose it.
Lose it. It means, Go crazy. Nuts. Insane. Bonzo. No longer in possession of one's faculties. Three fries short of a Happy Meal. WACKO!
I was having that problem myself, but in my last game I went for Writing much earlier than I used to, skipping the early techs. The religious ones in particular, I used to try for an early religion. Then I built a Library in my capital and created Scientists as soon as possible. Once I got enough GP points to build the Academy, I was pretty much the tech leader after that. Saladin gave me a bit of a run in the Industrial/Modern eras but that was partly because I was a bit slow building Universities when I had the chance. I eventually beat him again though. Mind you, I did manage to build the Great Library which no doubt made a difference.Originally posted by Lastpiper
Strange, my few attempts at Marathon have resulted in me falling way behind the AI civs in technology, and very early in the game. Initially I had this problem at all speeds because I hadn't figured out the value of cottages, but I'm still getting these results after fixing my strategy. Not sure what I'm doing wrong there - has anybody else noticed this?
So my tech priorities now are, get Archery for defence, go for Pottery to let my first Worker start building Cottages right away, then go for Writing to build the Library. At least it worked in my last game.
Last edited by Willem; January 26, 2006 at 20:37.
I finished a very interesting game on Marathon recently - a lot of fun, but I think that the developers should look at how the difficulty levels/map sizes and the adjustments mesh with the Marathon mode, because I just won a space race victory in 1120 AD.
I did a small continents map with the default number of civilizations, but played it on Warlord difficulty instead of my usual Noble (I'm not very good, I can only win about half the time on Noble unless I do a cheap chopping start, and play on Warlord sometimes if I want to experiment with strange strategies and not get wiped out by 1000 BC). My initial plan was to do a pseudo OCC as Mansa Musa and see how many religions I could get in my capital, but I found a scout, two workers, and agriculture from huts before I reseached Mysticism. I hated to see those workers go to waste, so I grabbed Bronze Working, chopped out a couple of settlers, Stonehenge, and the Pyramids. I skipped Mysticism so I could exploit my resources quickers, and I still got Judaism long before the AI got Buddhism (snagged by Hatty).
Long story short, I was cranking out so much commerce that by Classical times hardly any tech took more than 9 turns, and most were less. I hit Medieval well before 500 BC, when I finished the game in 1120AD I had every tech except Composites and Artillery (no need for them when my closest competitor were barely climbing out of the Renaissance era. Most modern techs were 3-7 turns to research, meaning they all would have been 1 or 2 on normal game length. Now, I know that tech rate goes faster relative to game year on Marathon because you have more time to build up your infrastructure, normally when I play Marathon on Noble the Industrial techs come about 200-300 years early, but most civs are relatively evenly matched.
I think the longer game speeds drastically increase the handicap the player gets on lower difficulty levels. This last game was fun, but I probably will have to create a custom difficulty level if I want to play something less than Noble on Marathon. With shorter game lengths, Warlord is easy, but if you sit back on one side of your continent and don't exploit your advantages to expand, the AI civs will catch up with you eventually. I achieved most of my Marathon blowout with only 5 cities (though I couldn't resist taking over my long-time friend Frederick when I started getting my industrial era units while he was still using longbows and swordsmen).
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